Archive | May, 2010

How fast Smart bro’s plug it can go. Well yesterday when i was on my way home from Cavite to Rizal, I decided to run some speedtest via speedtest.net. I made a test from several places in Cavite, Pasay, Makati, Pasig, Taytay and Angono. Using the HUAWEI E1553 wireless broadband modem.

This two are taken 2 to 3 km. away from the first one between the boundaries of Imus and Bacoor Cavite. (hmmm…. seems like no good at all.)

This one is from the end of C5 extension Rd. near the runway of the airport in Multi National Rd. Paranaque City.

This one is taken from the NAIA Terminal 3 parking lot beside the Smart Mobile Cell site.

Taken from the Global City in Makati in Front of the Market Market. (while Stuck on the traffic)

Now this one was taken from Barangay Ugong in Pasig city in front of the PLDT Data Center.

This two were taken in Taytay, Rizal. The first one was in Sandoval Bridge and the other one in Barkadahan Bridge around 4 km. apart ( almost half the difference in speed huh!)

And finally my last test was take in Balaw Balaw Angono, Rizal near the Smart cell site.

I’ve been using Smart Bro plug it since january 2010. Well some times it gives me a headache, but it has been very helpful to me since i do most of my work at the field and i need immediate access to my emails.

Google announced the Google TV, a new innovation in the TV industries and web, by integrating both internet and television experience.

Google TV is a new experience for television that combines the TV that you already know with the freedom and power of the Internet. With Google Chrome built in, you can access all of your favorite websites and easily move between television and the web. This opens up your TV from a few hundred channels to millions of channels of entertainment across TV and the web. Your television is also no longer confined to showing just video. With the entire Internet in your living room, your TV becomes more than a TV — it can be a photo slideshow viewer, a gaming console, a music player and much more.

Well knowing that Google is the top ranking when it comes to search engine, it can give you fast and the easy way to navigate to TV channels, web and applications. In an announcement at the Google I/O last May 20, 2010 Google is challenging web developers to come up with new Android application for the TV experience. Google is working together with Sony and Logitech to be able to put the Google TV inside the television and Blu-ray players. Google says that this will be available in the market this fall.

Ever had an experience hearing a music and you’ll said ” i know that song”, but cant remember the title or who is playing the music? well one of Sony Ericsson’s feature will come in handy in this situation. The TrackID™, by just recording partial part of the musing that is playing and sending it to TrackID, and in a matter of seconds it will send you back the title, singer and album of the song.

Its easy to use, you must have an internet connection to use this feature. Just open trackID™ from a compatible Sony Ericsson mobile phone record partial part of the song and then press “start”, TrackID™ will do the rest. It also has a capability to determine song titles and singer from the played tune in the built in FM tuner of a Sony Ericsson mobile pone. Since TrackID™ is powered by the Gracenote music database, which includes over 2.5 million songs, you’ll had a great chance of success results in finding song’s title and singer.

Looks like Microsoft Surface got a competition. This coming June, Sony is about to release their latest interactive touch-screen device that was developed by AtracSys and Sony as well, the Atrac-Trable. Well most of its feature is really much like of the Microsoft Surface but with added ability. I have only seen this tech stuff in the movie like the Minority Report and Iron Man, well i think this time its for real.

The sony Atrac-Table is a 35inches wide multi touch-screen HD display and controllable by gestures, and equipped with two two built-in Sony ISS XCD-V60 cameras which detects motion and project the 3D object. Same as the Microsoft Surface, it also has the ability to interact what ever digital object placed over it. Much more, Sony claims that it can also determine your gender, your age, and even your emotion. Imagine a device that can see or determine our emotion, cool isn’t it?

Price is not available yet, but for this kind of tech stuff that really shows a big change in our technology today I think it would not be far from Microsoft Surface starting price of $12,500 or maybe higher for its additional capabilities. Well lets just wait..

Well i think iPad users gonna love this one. Watch the video while Comcast CEO Brian Roberts, introduces the forthcoming iPad application that enables you to program and control your TV remotely.

Well this application gives you a better experience in setting up your cable TV and have the ability to shearch for show just by typing a search keyword through the virtual keyboard of the iPad, yah it is the feature that is missing in the cable box. It is very hard to search for thousands of in demand TV shows when you don’t have this feature. It also has a nice and cool looking interface and it is well categorized. You can just select what shows are on demand and you can also select if you only want to see whats on the news, movie and on sports.

Comcast team also says that they have plans on bring the TV in to the iPad it means the you can pull out TV shows directly to your iPad via the fancast video portal.

I think this would not give any inpact to the cable TV industries as long as subscribers keeps on paying their bill and receive quality shows. They can do as much application as they can put up, but in my own opinion, watching through a wide screen than the small one. what do you think?

Industrial ceramics plays a great role in our technology today, it covers all products that are made from inorganic, non metallic materials and having industrial or technical applications. The materials normally consist of substance with high melting or softening point. The term “industrial ceramics” also refers to the science and technology of developing and manufacturing such products. The industrial ceramics are a large group of materials having specialized uses other than domestic or aesthetic. They generally exclude glasses, enamels, building materials and certain cements and refractories. The fundamentals of industrial ceramics derive from its name ceramics, which is a term applied to all useful or ornamental clay objects that are baked.

The use of ceramics in industrial technology starts in the early 19th century, by developing a strong porcelains for high voltage electrical insulations. Steatites and cordierites, also with special electrical and mechanilcal properties where produces in the 20th century. This products where obtained largerly by blending and then heating to high temperatures materials, such as various clays, of variables or uncertain purity. Wide range of new material with specified properties for use in industrial ceramics had an increasing demands in the 1930’s.

Primary Components Of Industrial Ceramics

Compound

Chemical formula

Melting Point (°C.)

Oxides

Aluminum oxide

Al₂O₂

2054

Barium oxide

BaO

1917

Iron oxide

Fe₂O₃

1565

Lead oxide

PbO

886

Magnesium oxide

MgO

2800

Silicon oxide

SiO₂

1726

Titanium dioxide

TiO₂

1800

Zirconium dioxide

ZrO₂

2680

Non-oxides

Boron carbide

B₄C

2450*

Silicon carbide

SiC

2650*

Tungsten carbide

WC

2600

Aluminum nitride

AlN

2235*

Boron nitride

BN

3000*

Silicon nitride

Si₃N₄

1900*

Molybdenum disilicide

MoSi₂

2030

*Decomposition Temperature

Industrial ceramics has different properties that determine the range and extent of their uses.

Chemical properties. Most industrial ceramics are consist of metals and semimetals with non metals and the common primary components are oxides. A few nitrides, carbides, borides, and compounds containing more than one non metal. Other material that may be regarded as ceramics are the elements silicon and carbon in the form of diamonds and graphite. In general, ceramics are more resistant to oxidation and corrosion than plastic and metals.

Mechanical properties. Most industrial ceramics are strong , that is, they show considerable strength and stiffness under compression and bending. “Bend Strength” is commonly used as a criterion of merit and in design calculation. The highest strength polycrystalline ceramic material are based on zirconium dioxide.

Physical properties. Industrial ceramics are compound of light non metals (oxygen, carbon, or nitrogen) with a lighter metals or semi metals. In general, ceramics have low densities compared with metals. And given the part size the strength-to-weight can be higher than for a metal. Many ceramics are also very hard, and resist wear and abrasion. The hardest material known is diamond, followed by boron nitride in cubic crystal form.

Thermal properties. Industrial ceramics has a very high melting or softening points. They retain strength and resistance to deformation under load (“creep” resistance) at temperatures higher than those to which many metal can be exposed. However, these brittle material is weak to “thermal shock”, it is a term for the generation of mechanical stress as a result of a sudden and severe change in temperature than can lead to failure.

Electrical properties. Ceramics exhibit a wide range of electrical conductivities. For example, aluminum oxide is a very good insulator, silicon carbide is a semiconductor at room temperature, and compounds such as chromium dioxide conduct electricity as a metal do. The presence of mobile ions in an oxide or silicate may give rise to ionic conductivity, which increases in high temperature. This is said to be the reason why porcelains cannot be use as a insulators at a high temperatures. On the other hand the mobility of ions in certain types of oxide allows materials such as ß-alumina to be use as electrolytes in energy storage device like battery.

Magnetic properties. Ferrites or ceramics containing iron oxide, Fe₂O₃—can have magnetic properties similar to those of magnetic containing iron, nickel and cobalt. Unlike metals, ferrite can be made with high electrical resistance and can be used at high frequencies without an acceptable loss of power. They can be also made with a high resistance to demagnetization.

Optical properties. The optical characteristic of a ceramic depend on both intrinsic factor (determining color) and extrinsic (governing transparency). The color of a single crystal depends on the amount of ion in the crystal. Most single-crystal oxides transmit some visible lights; semiconducting single-crystal may appear completely black. Transparency is determined by the presence of light-scattering “flaws” such as grain boundaries and internal voids.

Industrial ceramics is applied and use in many products today such as insulator for high voltage transmission line, spark plugs for automobile and motored vehicles, turbine rotors to drive electric generator and water pumps, Ball bearings, electronic components like integrated circuit (IC) and resistors.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) scientist had just made another breakthrough in the solar power technology, they had successfully printed a solar cells on a paper. Well its seems that nano technology is beginning to grow. In a press conference last Tuesday as mentioned in the CNET news, Susan Hockfield, MIT’s president, and Paolo Scaroni, CEO of Italian oil company Eni, officially Lunched the Eni-MIT Solar Frontiers Research Center. The research center had been investing millions of dollars and also receiving funding from the National Science Foundation as said by Vladimir Bulovic, the center’s director.

Image Credits: Martin LaMonica/CNET

The MIT researchers are using a carbon-based dye materials and the cells had a 1.5 to 2 percent accuracy in converting sunlight to energy. The research was headed by MIT professor Karen Gleason and has submitted the paper for scientific review and not had been published yet.

Well this kind of breakthrough in the solar technology could be a better help for us when published. Its could be cheaper than the conventional solar panel and lighter. I see many application could benefits this especially countries that in need of alternative power source.

Microsoft Surface, A multi-touch screen device developed by Microsoft, capable of responding to a natural hand gesture and real-world objects. Keyboards and mouse are not needed, you can just grab digital object with your hands and drag it. The Microsoft surface has the ability to identify and interact with an object place on the screen allowing you to transfer information between devices like digital camera and mobile phone.

Video credits from PopularMechanics.com

Microsoft Surface technology uses cameras and images in the infrared spectrum, making it possible to recognize different object that was placed on the screen and then processed by the computer to display the content of digital devices such as camera and mobile phone. The user can now interact with it just simply by using hand gesture instead of mouse and keyboard.

Microsoft Surface’s technology started in 2001, when Stivie Batiche of Microsoft Hardware and Andy Wilson of Microsoft research began exploring the concept of a interactive table. Their goal is to mix physical and virtual world to provide rich interactive experience. This idea was then presented by the New Consumer Products Group to Bill Gates, and then a month after the first fully working prototype was created, based on an IKEA table and sheets of architect vellum as a diffuser. Microsoft Surface begun evolving as more application was created. In 2007 the team developed and became the Surface Computing group and begun refining the prototype’s functionality and application. They have built more prototype for use by some software developers, hardware developers and researchers. In 2007 the team shift from prototyping to building the and preparing to sell the first fully functional multi touch-screen multi-user computer and was commercialize in 2008.